Tears
by adaptation
Summary: Everything goes blurry and she doesn't know why until she feels the tickle of a tear sliding down her cheek.  & Entry in the Forever Yours series. Takes place 2 weeks after 3x16, "No Rest for the Wicked", May 2008.


**Title:** Forever Yours - "Tears"  
><strong>Summary:<strong> for spn_30snapshots , theme "ELEMENTAL". Post 3x16 (May 2008), Jo receives the news of Dean's death  
><strong>Word count:<strong> 723  
><strong>Status:<strong> one-shot  
><strong>Disclaimer:<strong> All characters are owned by Kripke, et al, and I only borrow them to indulge in my sick, road trip-provoked fantasies.  
><strong>Notes:<strong> I DON'T KNOW IF I LIKE THIS OMG. *runs into traffic* The prompt table is here.

Jo's just stepped out of her morning shower and she's still dripping on the floor when her phone goes off with a metallic-sounding version of _Take It On The Run_. She lets it ring itself out, because she's not comfortable walking around naked in the skeevy little motel room she's in and she'd rather dry off before she gets down to business for the day. But her attitude changes completely when, toweling her hair dry and padding around the room in her panties, she picks up her cell and sees 7 MISSED CALLS staring accusingly at her from the screen. Her voicemail is just a series of hangups, but caller ID says it was five times her mother and twice Bobby Singer. She calls her mother back first.

"What the hell have you been doin', Joanna Beth?" Ellen's angry. Jo doesn't know why. She was only showering, she hadn't been ignoring her phone for more than twenty minutes. She's taken aback, because their relationship has been so good for the past year, since they've been hunting together. Ellen would be with her right now if she hadn't swung by Bobby's the night before to check some research for their next hunt. But she wasn't due back until this afternoon, so Jo doesn't know what the problem is.

"I was in the shower," she blurts defensively, clutching her soggy towel between her breasts. "What's wrong?"

"I'm here at Bobby's, and he just told me -" Ellen cuts herself off, takes a breath, and Jo's heart stops dead in her chest for a second. "It's Dean Winchester, Jo. He's dead."

She doesn't hear anymore. She knows her mother's talking, explaining something, but she doesn't process any of it. She feels like she has cotton balls stuffed in her ears, and then she drops the phone and the impact sends the battery flying out the back of it, skittering over the floor. She drops to her knees on the dirty carpet, not of her own volition. The towel slips and then her hands are in her hair, pushing it away from her face, and she's hyperventilating. Everything goes blurry and she doesn't know why until she feels the tickle of a tear sliding down her cheek.

She doesn't remember anything after that.

Four days later, they're in Wisconsin, exorcising a poltergeist in a mental institution. Her head and her heart aren't in it, and her mother knows but doesn't comment. Jo's been off her game all week, and doesn't take a psychic to know why. But Ellen knows her daughter well enough to know that if she wanted to talk about it, she would. So Ellen leaves her alone, and Jo's thankful for that.

She's spent four days trying to comprehend the news of Dean's death. She's spent four days living inside her own head, and it's not a place she's comfortable with extended stays. It doesn't make sense, she knows, to be this upset. She barely knew him. He didn't even like her. It was just some stupid crush she had on him, and while he might have been mildly amused by it at first she knew it had to have quickly grown into an annoyance. It hadn't taken her long to realize that he felt like he was babysitting her whenever they were together. And maybe that's part of why she's crying.

Every night, she cries. Ellen pretends not to notice, but every night Jo curls into a ball on the motel mattress, her knees pressed against her chest as silent, wracking sobs shake her body with every exhalation. She lays like that for hours until sleep falls over her, her only temporary relief from the pain she feels.

She can't help but relive every little interaction she ever had with him. What a little girl he must have thought her. And now he's dead and there's no way she'll ever be able to change that perception. He didn't live long enough to see what she's become, how she can stab a shifter with the best of 'em. And even when she's over it, months after he's gone, she can't help thinking how stupid she was, and she hates herself for it.

But there's nothing she can do. All she can do now is be better.


End file.
